Hi, everyone. I'm Daniel Williams, senior editor at MGMA. We're back for another MGMA podcast live from Orlando for our twenty twenty five Leaders Conference. And I have a special guest that I am so excited that we have on the show today, Maryann Kowakse, who came all the way from Qatar to enjoy the show. So Maryann, welcome.

Thank you. Thank you, Daniel.

Yeah. I was talking to our mutual friend, Linda Carroll, previously at I the was thinking that Linda, who came all the way from Alaska, might've traveled the farthest distance.

No, beat everyone at I think

the you set the record with I did. So tell us about that. All the way from Qatar, how did you even know about MGMA? Bring us up to speed in

MGMA, that so I used to work in Alabama prior to Qatar.

Okay.

And when we went to Qatar, I went to Qatar to build, we have a hospital that we started from scratch, so it's a Greenfield hospital. It was a great opportunity to go and be involved in that. I've been there for a year. I went with the intention of staying for a year. I've been there.

This is my eighth year. So I have no intentions of leaving until they tell me to leave. So the hospital is doing great. We came to a point where we started looking for benchmarks because we're expanding our compensation scheme and we wanted to see how the best benchmarks, we needed benchmarks is basically what we needed. So I remembered we had MGMA as we used it back in The States so I tried to advocate to get it.

It's very expensive because we have to get an organizational membership because I was the only one that was going to be using it. But it was one of the, I think we're one of the two international hospitals, I'm not sure. There's somebody out there, there's one other country that has MGMA as well.

So

I kept on pushing for it and we finally got the organizational membership. I think this is the second or the third year. So yeah, I've been, we've been using it.

We've been

using it. It's very interesting.

I have so many questions I wanna First, ask you you had me at Alabama because now I'm singing. I'm going from Alabama I'm to thinking, because I came from Alabama with a banjo on my knee, and I went out and moved out to California.

Oh, okay.

That was culture shock. But Alabama to Qatar,

similarities prior to that the culture shock, I had a previous culture shock. I'm originally from New York. I went from New York

to Alabama.

New York to Alabama. I needed a translator from English to English when I

got there. You

did. After that, was Alabama to Qatar.

Okay. I have to ask, because I lived in Alabama for I 15 was in Birmingham. Where were you?

I lived in Hoover. I worked at Children's of Alabama.

That's amazing. What a small world. We went all the way to Qatar to connect here in our Alabama connection.

So the reason I come here is because exactly what you said. You spoke to Linda, who met me. It's the networking. It is. It's an amazing opportunity.

So Linda's a pleasure as well. I can call her out on here. I know. I So she said, you have to meet with Daniel. And I said, who's Daniel?

Okay. So, yeah.

Yeah. Well, I just bumped into her at the breakfast. You're gonna leave for our breakfast right after this interview. And she told me, you found the Qatar job on LinkedIn or they headhunted you or Tell us about that story because that sounded interesting.

There's a lot of things in the background that led me to search for a job and when I went on it was just the, like indeed the normal, you know, websites that have the positions. And I just put out an application and then I completely changed my mind about it. And then somebody called me and they said, let's do an interview. We really want to talk to you. And I said, no, I don't think so.

And then they called again. And that the second time I said, okay, let me do an interview.

Okay.

And I did. And I said, I'll take a chance. We'll go for a year.

And there we are. That is so incredible. Well, here's an immediate question because I don't know global health insurance or anything. I mean, translates? Because you're coming from Qatar, a practice in Qatar.

You're here in The US, in Orlando at an MGMA event. Where do the healthcare principles processes a connection where you can get something

It's out of this very interesting. One of the sessions I attended yesterday, they were talking about expanding their ambulatory care, which is exactly what I'm doing, working on right now.

Okay.

It's exactly the same. The health care there and here, it's exactly the same. We have national health insurance, and we also have the private health insurance. And the ambulatory care is the same issue, getting people in, the long wait times, the space constrictions, it's the same story. So it's very interesting to hear a different perspective on what they're doing and how it can relate to what I'm doing.

So I think that's what I benefit out of these conferences is that I heard what they did. I said, okay, I did that as well. But then I asked a few more questions where, what are they, you know, what type of benchmarking they're using and things like that. And it's the same story in a different location. Really, it just translates just like that.

Well, tell us, is there something strikingly different from one country to the next in healthcare, the way it's presented, the way patients are met?

Strikingly different. So they have a national health, so it's a government subsidized program. So I work at a tertiary hospital for women and children.

So

we have, in our hospital for, I'll take pediatrics as an example, We have the sole service providers. So we have the specialists that are not available anywhere else. So children come to us and they come and they pay a, just a copay $30.50 riyals, which is equivalent of $10 or something like that. It's a small amount of money. It's just like government, like Medicaid, similar to that.

They pay the amount and they see the specialist that we have. If they decided to go elsewhere, they would have to use their private insurance. So the companies also provide us private insurance. But we are the sole service for the country of all the pediatrics. So we have specialists that come from all around the world.

We have world renowned physicians. We have, like our pediatric urologists, they created services, they created opportunities for children that didn't exist. We did separated congenital twins. They have a lot of specialty, specialty surgeries that are taking place in Qatar. I know a lot of people don't think about it, but they're really innovative, very innovative.

That is so cool. Yeah. So we're on the last day here at the Leaders Conference.

Yes.

What's a thing or two that stood out to you? I know that networking, those connections, what else? What's been going on that you really, that really resonated with you?

So the one thing I'm looking at, I really enjoy looking at the AI right

now. Okay.

Everybody's talking about AI. Yeah, are. There's at least probably five of sessions I attended had to do with AI. How to leverage AI for what you're doing, but they also focused on the human part of it. So AI is intended to do things that are mundane tasks, things like that.

Right.

But what they focused on at this conference is that you have to free yourself up to do the human things, connecting with your team, being able to do the things that you don't have time to do when you're doing your job. I think that was a really interesting perspective on it. Yeah.

I love that. Yeah. One more question then. Detail for us, because I'm just trying to imagine, I just flew to Spain earlier this summer, and that was somewhat of an ordeal. But I want, what was the logistics like to travel from Qatar to Orlando?

Where did you start? And I know where you wound up. You wound up here in Orlando.

So from Qatar, had a direct flight to Miami. That was about fifteen. Yeah. Hours. Fifteen hours.

And then a forty minute from Miami to

Yeah, that was nothing. So fifteen hours. What's your go to when you're on a plane for fifteen hours? Do you read a book? Do you watch a movie?

What are you doing on

I a plane

for took 15 a

flight that was at one a. M. So my go to was eight hours of sleep. So it was nice. I had a good flight.

Did you wake up and it was yesterday or the day? How does that go? I woke up

and it was, you know what, don't know.

You lived Sunday twice. You had the same So day

when you're coming to The States, you gain some time and when you leave, you lose

some Okay. When are you heading back to Qatar?

I will be taking a few more days. I'm heading to New York.

Okay.

And then I'll be heading to Qatar.

Is that where you grew up in I New so. Fantastic. Yeah. What else? Said that was the last question, but anything else you wanna share with us?

Anybody who might be listening like, Hey, if I came all the way for Qatar, you can come

It's from definitely worth it. It's worth the networking, as I said, You learn a lot of things even though you think you know everything.

Right.

But honestly, need training. They need continuous updates and things like that that we lack. And understand it helps you to understand your leadership style so you can go back and lead your team appropriately.

All right. Well Mary Anne, thank you for coming all the way from Qatar. This is just amazing. Just glad to have you here.

One thing interestingly enough, I know you have to go but these all the vendors that I've spoken to, and when they asked me, where are you from? And I say, Qatar, they, where? So I think we have to educate people where Qatar is. Nobody knows how's it

the World Cup? You think that kind of

put it on

the map for me? Then there was the debate, is it Qatar? Is it Qatar?

But either way, everybody says it before. They do. So interesting. Yeah.

Okay. Well, it's great having you

here. Pleasure. Was nice meeting you.

You too. Well, everyone, this is Daniel Williams, senior editor at MGMA meeting with Mary Anne all the way from Qatar. So thank you so much for being MGMA podcast listeners.